I am always curious to find out how other people, different than the ones I regularly work with, manage projects. A few months ago I had the pleasure to participate in a session with a Lama from Tibet.

I received many requests to analyse not only notorious project failures, but also study those projects that were extremely successful. On this occasion, I selected what we could claim to be the best commercial project ever run in history, the Purple project.

With the aim of learning from past failures, this section analyses, using a simplified framework developed over more than ten years, a notorious project that was poorly managed and was terribly unsuccessful. What is fascinating about all projects is that they all share a set of common characteristics, which, if well understood, soundly addressed, and actively managed; can increase the chances of success and minimize the risk of failure.

I had the pleasure of interviewing Robin Speculand, one of the first experts focusing on strategy implementation. I was curious to hear about his personal project, as well as his views on the link between project management and successful strategy execution.

One of the most surprising project failures I came recently across was the one of the new Berlin airport. It is rare to see a project of such size fail, especially in Germany, a country known for its effectiveness, efficiency and planning capabilities.

I had the pleasure of interviewing Stuart Crainer and Des DearLove, founders of Thinkers50, launched in 2001, and the first-ever global ranking of management thinkers. I was curious to hear about their project, as well as their views on thought leadership, and why project management has been ignored by most of the “gurus”.